Calibans and Tempests (HUM455)

From Peter Greenaway’s Prospero’s Books (aka “the naked Tempest”):

An earlier BBC version of the Tempest. This clip begins with the dialog between Propsero and Ariel and then leads up to the former’s exchange with Caliban.

A series of trailers for films based on the Tempest.

The animated Tempest.

Derek Jarman’s “gay Tempest“– all 90-odd minutes!

All That is Solid (HUM225)

“The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.”

Tuesday (HUM470)

We didn’t discuss Berry’s essay much at all on Thursday, though I think that text is valuable– despite being so glib– for what it can tell us about the search for what in the old days used to be known as national character. Here’s a bit of a tangent: during the Cold War, when American Studies departments were being instituted in universities across the United States, the project of defining America according to its peculiar virtues (and, to an extent, vices) grew in stature. For generations up to that point various politicians, preachers, and writers had set themselves the task of explaining what it was that made America America. As early as Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America (granted, he was visiting from France) intellectuals had seen the US as exceptional in both its birth and its social dynamics. Taken to an extreme such speculation hardened into the nationalist sentiments of American Exceptionalism, which lifted the US above all other nations as the world’s (i.e. Western civilisation’s) last, best hope. On the other hand writers such as Constance Rourke took a more ironic, even self-deprecating tack, examining the mythologies which animate national identity. Her American Humor is a classic of the genre of the national character study and in another version of this course I might even use it. The point is, that Berry is clearly willing to undertake a panoramic view of American autobiography and in the process to generalize about Americans and American mores and institutions. Such an effort is a bit unfashionable these days, but interesting nonetheless because it offers us the opportunity to consider some of the well-thumbed cliches of national self-perception. Are Americans, as has so often been asserted, truly rugged individuals who lift themselves up by their bootstraps? Is America a massive (s)Melting Pot, forever at a low simmer, absorbing the foreign particles of immigrants into its eclectic broth? Remember what Utah Phillips said: America is a great big melting pot. All the scum rises to the top and everybody on the bottom gets burned. We don’t need to be quite so cynical, but the point is aptly made: as a model of social formation the Pot– like the Mixed Salad or the Mosaic– carries an implicit ideological charge. The way we think about things determines what we will think.

Value (HUM225)

Ideally, even lecture classes contain an element of dialog. Paolo Freire, the Brazilian theorist of pedagogy, took great pains to explain that an effective education cannot be governed by what he called “the banking concept of education“– a principle which holds that students are merely passive, empty vessels which the teacher-expert attempts to fill.

Asking questions starts that dialog and improves teaching. Yesterday someone inquired about the assignments for this coming week. In responding to her I tipped my hand about the purpose of these readings and how they relate to the course as a whole. Here’s what I wrote:

New Location/ Music (HUM470)

Against all expectation we’ve managed to secure a new room with better media equipment. Our new classroom is in HUM 286. We’ll meet there on Tuesday. Pass the word along if you see anyone from class.

Also, I’d like you to submit a youtube clip of a track that you think constitutes an example of life narrative to the comments section of this post. Paula and Monica have already done so. Paula’s choice reminds me of my grandfather, who had an old 8-track cassette with this song on it:

“A Boy Named Sue” was written by Shel Silverstein, the author of The Giving Tree, and recorded by Johnny Cash at a concert at San Quentin Prison.

Life Narrative (HUM470)

I was going through your questionnaires looking for musical advice and selected a few of the artists mentioned. First, a remarkable clip of Billie Holiday singing Travelin’ Light:

More Maps (HUM455)

The kingdoms of Spain, ca. 1200 CE:

Questionnaire (HUM225/ 455/ 470)

Questionnaire

1. legal name

2. preferred name

3. place/date of birth

4. are you a first generation college student?

5. are you a military veteran?

if so, what was your job/ period of enlistment?

6. are you fluent in more than one language/ did you grow up speaking more than one language? which ones?

7. have you taken, or are you currently taking, ENG 114 (or equivalent) or a CMS course?

8. what is your primary area of study?

9. what was the best non-required book you read in the last year?

10. what was the last film you saw in a theater?

11. name three musicians, groups and/or genres you enjoy.

12. pick one. what about his/her/their music do you like?

Mapping (HUM225/455/470)

http://analepsis.wordpress.com/2011/08/22/maps-hum-225-415-455/

 

http://analepsis.wordpress.com/2010/08/24/maps-vial-contcult-americas/

 

http://analepsis.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/continents-hum455/

Goodbye Etta

Etta James, 1938-2012.